Tag: olympos

And Back We Go From Whence We Came

~ stull61 ~ Leave a comment

With fridge stocked, we said our goodbyes and left Kemmer about 3pm and headed back to Phaselis. With 5 on board, Ewa, Myself, Eric (the autopilot), Little Eric (the remote control for Eric) and Rod (the cruising guide), it felt good to be back on the sea. We dropped anchor a few hours later and settled in for the night.

We needed to get to Fineke by Wednesday, so I decided we would spend our time at Olympos rather than doing the ruins at both Phaselis and Olympos. I was also put off by Mike saying someone had climbed onto a yacht at Phaselis – all very suspicious.

Olympos turned out to be as spectacular as it was the first time. It was a great place to wander around with Ewa, as she was a better photographer than I was and it was fun to chase good shots together. We spend half an hour trying to take the money shot of a spectacular blue dragonfly. In the end, I’m afraid to say she got the better shot. Her dad thought it was photoshopped – it was that good.

Back on the boat, it was time to introduce Ewa (pronounced Eva) to stand up paddle boarding, which she managed quite well for a new comer. Then it off to get an anchorage close to Finike for the night so we could go in the next day and get our repairs done.

Are we got round the cape we got hit with 30kts right on the nose. We bashed into it a bit but without a mainsail it was pretty horrible. So we pretty soon called it quits and consulted Rod. Rod told us about Cavus Limani and it turned out to be a good recommendation.

Next morning, we hauled anchor and headed for Finike Marina. All our parts had arrived, and we found an excellent sail maker so we had a very productive stop getting our dingy winch, shower sump pump and bilge pump operational again. We repacked the ball bearings in all of the batten cars and I’ve decided not to let the mainsail freefall when taking it down as Vicsail showed me. Nowadays I ease it down in a more controlled fashion.

It was get to sail again, even it meant tacking all the way against the wind. We got some reefing practice early as we left Finike bound for Kalekoi. It was fun sailing and we sailed pretty well all the way to the start of Kekova Roads. Ewa was busy sleeping and didn’t wake up until we got pretty much to the crusader castle. She had one of those jaw dropping moments as we motored up to our anchorage.

All my Olympos photos are at https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.10201909126122698.1073741922.1620379103&type=1&l=498f53f18b

Roman Ruin Time Again

~ stull61 ~ Leave a comment
We were quite excited to have a look at Finike as lots of cruisers had said good things about the place. The marina turned out to be really nice but the town was a major disappointment. They had tried to do it up, but all they managed to do was make it more tacky.
It did however have some good tradesmen at reasonable prices and we got the shower sump pump, dingy winch and one of the bilge pump sensors diagnosed and parts ordered from Istanbul (to be picked up on way back). More boat bucks.
We managed to get away about 3.30pm . We headed across the bay and around the corner to a nice beach.
We were right on track for beer o’clock when bummer, the mainsail got stuck, 3/4 of the way down. Luckily there was no wind so going up the mast was a lot easier than last time. We got the sail down with a bit of silicon spray and some gentle persuasion and decided it must be a lubrication issue. So on went more silicon spray.
Mainsail in lazy bag, we finally anchored and Beer o’clock was just reward for climbing the mast.
Next morning we had a great swim around the bay and headed off for ancient Olympos. We motor sailed along the coast against a 0.5-1 kt current and got there at lunchtime. We anchored outside the roped off swim area and i donned the water proof back bag and paddled in with Jo swimming to shore.
The beach was beautiful, albeit stoney,  with a freshwater stream running into the sea. Olympos is just behind the beach and we wandered up to it only to find a ticket booth wanting 5th entry fee. So it was back to the boat on the paddle board to get some more money plus a few other things we forgot.
Then it was back along the deep shaded valley that runs up from the sea. Olympos was founded by Rhodes in about the 2nd century BC and had another upturn in property market values when the Romans moved into the neighbourhood. The last bit of ancient stuff happened when the Genovese build a castle high on the hill. The place is very pretty and it took us longer than expected to wander through the ruins.
By this stage we were getting hungry so we stopped at the hippy inspired restaurant amongst the shady trees and gobbled down some Turkish pancakes.  Nothing to write home about (wait a minute – I just did!) but can now say I’ve tasted them.
Back on the boat we back tracked a couple of miles to Port Genovese and found an anchorage amongst the gulets with sufficient swing room to feel comfortable. Jo was busying herself for another phone interview so I went for a swim and checked the anchor. Back on the boat I saw another gulet come in and drop his anchor way out as they do and then back into shore really close to our anchor. I was a bit peeved that he may have laid his anchor chain over ours and swam out again to check (in fact he had laid it over Sun Dancers who were further out that us.
Then it was off to check out the bay on the paddle board – a productive exercise as I came across Sami (Davis Jnr) and friends and sat down and drank Turkish Tea. Sami was a professional captain who had come out on his day off and we had a great yarn.
Back at La Mischief with Jo’s interview over, we had Trevor and Yvonne from Sun Dancer over for sun downers – a lovely English couple who were good for a ribbing about cricket and the world cup.
Just as we’d gone to bed, the wind changed and we had to get up again as we swung dangerously close to our errant gullet. I was kicking myself that I was more concerned about crossed anchors than swing room. So Jo got her first night sail!!! as we shifted into the middle of the bay – well out of range of any gullet mayhem.
Next morning we set off motoring to Phaselis, another ancient Roman town. Rod told us to use a trip line because of our the rubble from the ancient Roman breakwaters, but looking down we could see there was no real need.
Phaselis is set on a beautiful peninsular, between two equally beautiful bays. It too was founded by colonists from Rhodes in the 7th Century BC but the ruins were largely Roman  and Byzantine. Hadrian’s gate at the entrance of the street that runs from the North Bay to the South Bay was a highlight. It was once again a very pretty place with extensive ruins set amongst the pine trees. Unfortunately the Turks had put a car park right up against some very impressive aqueduct ruins. Whenever you see an aqueduct ruin you feel compelled to utter the now famous “What Have the Romans Ever Done for Us?” line from Life of Brian.
Ruined out once more, we pulled anchor and headed for Kemmer.